


Dear Alice

by LT_Aldo_Raine



Series: The Way Things Should've Been [1]
Category: Godless (TV 2017)
Genre: Country & Western, F/M, Happy Ending, Letters, Love Letters, Post-Canon, Western
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-01
Updated: 2018-02-01
Packaged: 2019-03-12 02:37:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13537899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LT_Aldo_Raine/pseuds/LT_Aldo_Raine
Summary: The letter came for her five months after Roy left for California. Dear Alice, it began. In the letter, there was everything.OR: Roy writes to Alice after he makes it to his brother's place in California and asks for her and the boy to join him by the ocean.





	Dear Alice

**Author's Note:**

> The ending we all wanted. 
> 
> Because even though Roy leaving made for a better TV conclusion, the shippers want what the shippers want.

The letter came for her five months after he left for California.

Much to Alice's surprise, it was Bill McNue who delivered it. He rode out to the farm early one evening, just before the sun began to set on the cactus-speckled horizon. The sheriff broke custom, neglecting to come inside for a pot of tea as he usually did on such visits. Instead, from high on his horse, he reached down and extended the wrinkled, well-traveled envelope.

“This came for you,” he said in a tone that was clipped, controlled—but not unkind. The sheriff struggled to avoid her gaze, and when Alice reached out to take the letter, slowly, as if approaching a wounded animal, Bill scoffed. “What? Thought I wouldn't bring it to you? ...yeah, I'm a touch surprised myself. I had half the mind to burn it. Last thing I want is you stayin' in love with him.”

“I'm not in love with him,” Alice retorted, her words too quick, her brow too stern, to be believable.

She didn't show the letter to Truckee. Folding it and shoving it in her apron, Alice did her best to forget about the mail as she continued about her daily duties on the ranch. It wasn't until night had truly, firmly descended on the Fletcher home—until both Truckee and Granny were sound asleep, and the horses had calmed for the night—that Alice tucked herself into the rocking chair near the fireplace and retrieved the letter.

She stared at her name on the front of the envelope for some time. She wondered at the strange, unfamiliar handwriting—perhaps he had dictated the letter to his brother? Or was he too stubborn for that? Her fingertips traced the foreign script, felt the withered edges of the paper envelope, her forefinger slipping under the fold and wiggling it loose.

A single sheet of paper was folded inside.

The name—written in a small, inelegant print—immediately drew her eyes: _Roy Goode_.

His handwriting had changed, she noted faintly with something like trepidation. What else had changed about him in the many months that he had been gone? Her eyes flickered over the page, as if trying to take it all in at once, before she finally settled on another name at the top of the letter—her own name.

_Dear Alice,_ it began. 

In the letter, there was everything.

Roy wrote an apology first. He had wanted to write them sooner, had thought of her and Truckee often since that day he rode out of La Belle.  _How is the boy? Is he takin care of that horse? Make sure that he keeps gettin up when he falls off—he's got to show the horse who has the power_ . 

He wrote to her of his brother and the life the eldest Goode had built in California.  _ I think you'd like Jim. He's a good man. He's been helping me with my readin and writin, and he got me a job at a lumber mill. His wife is real sweet, but she is sorta shy. Its hard to see him with her sometimes. I feel strange to remember my brother as a boy and see him now as a man. So much has happened. We're both so different since we lost our paw, and now Jimmy's a father himself. His son is something else. He reminds me of the boy, the way his eyes are always full of wonder. It makes me miss Truckee somethin awful.  _

At that, Alice let the letter fall to her lap. Her eyes lifted to the flickering flames in the fireplace. Little wisps of smoke floated up the stack. The widow watched, dazed, as the embers danced in the firebox, somehow a thousand different shades of orange and yellow and black. Roy's words echoed in her mind, and she was forced to finally acknowledge what she had fought for so long. 

God, she missed Roy. 

She missed him like she missed her late, second husband, Truckee's father. She missed the smell and the touch of him—however brief a time she had had to touch him. She missed his voice—the rough timbre, the twang and lilt. She missed watching him work—with the horses, on the ranch, with Truckee. Lord, had she loved to watch that man with her son. Once Alice had realized that Roy was not a danger (not a danger to her, never a danger to them), it had warmed her heart and satisfied the mother in her to see Roy and Truckee conspiring together—Roy patiently teaching Truckee this, Truckee proudly showing Roy that. 

Alice was consumed by the great swell of emotions rising within her. Longing, sadness, anger, hope. Images of Roy and his time with her family on the ranch flashed through her mind, one after the other. He had seemed so at home here with her, with them. He had endured Granny's judgment and ire. He had helped mend the fence and finish the well (a project that would have taken her and Truckee another two months) despite it never being part of their agreement. He dined with them, broke bread and prayed, slept under her roof and kept the coldest parts of her warm on the night they went to bed together. He had become a part of them—and then he left. 

Summoning all of her pride, Alice tamped down her riled feelings and returned to the letter, eager to hear more from the man who came upon their lives like a shooting star—bright and all-consuming, then gone in an instant. 

Roy closed the letter by writing to her about the ocean and the home that he was making for himself there. _I wish that you could see the ocean. My brother was right—it seems to go on forever. It would be a real nice spot to teach a boy how to fish. Alice, I know that Boston was your home, but if you still believe that there's nothing for you in La Belle, I'm gone ask you not go to Boston. Come here to Atascadero. My brother's land is real nice, plenty of room for you and the boy—even that mean ole Granny of yours. I've been working on a house, and its nearly built now. Would be ready for y'all by the time you reach California_.

Her chest felt tight. She couldn't breathe, couldn't suck in a single breath. Her heart was pounding fast and hard against her rib cage. Roy wanted her to come to California. Wanted them _all_ to come to California. He wanted to teach Truckee to fish in the ocean, was building a house with extra room for Granny. She ran her finger over his signature. _With affection, Roy Goode._ Roy had finally found his brother, his family—he was finally, finally home, and yet he was still thinking about her and her son. 

A sudden great burst of air filled her lungs, and Alice knew that she was smiling wider than she ever had in her life. A joyous sound—a laugh, a gasp of relief?—escaped her, and she bolted to her feet, letter and skirt clutched in her grasp, to show Truckee the letter.

She did not have to think about the journey, did not have to question the move. She would take the money that Roy had hidden under the fence post to buy a wagon and supplies for the long, arduous trip. There was nothing for her and her son in La Belle, nothing but bad memories and the ghosts of the men that were no longer with them. She would take her family to California. She would give her boy a father, would settle them all in his home by the sea. 

Crossing the room, Alice knelt beside her son's cot. “Truckee, wake up.” She gently shook his shoulder until the young boy roused, and said, smiling softly in the moonlight, “We're going to California.” 

 

**Author's Note:**

> A possible reunion scene with Roy and Alice in California to follow, if folks want it.


End file.
